I prefer bottles of whiskey. Beer and wine are for pussies. And no, I'm not a man, but I can outdrink them. If my boys wanted to try a shot before they were 21, I wouldn't give it to them. I'm married to a LEO, and it is illegal where we live.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely. And it isn't illegal to do so. Nothing will happen by magic on his 21st so that he knows how to drink responsibly.

You get there from learning the feeling of alcohol in your own system.

Then why not start in preschool? Lots of practice!

You don't know anything about how the brain develops, do you?

You are ridiculous.

At 21 my son will use his unformed brain to make poor choices, as has been true from time immemorial. At 19, he will move out. I figure, if I can help tech him moderation before he goes, at an age when getting ahold of alcohol is likely to happen (which isn't generally true in extended day, Hebrew school. Soccer practice... all the places a little kid might be) he might be better informed.

I think you don't know too many teens. They really are quite independent and we parents have opportunities to guide, but not control.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely. And it isn't illegal to do so. Nothing will happen by magic on his 21st so that he knows how to drink responsibly.

You get there from learning the feeling of alcohol in your own system.

Then why not start in preschool? Lots of practice!

You don't know anything about how the brain develops, do you?

Because having a beer at 20 is exactly like having a beer at 2?

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely. And it isn't illegal to do so. Nothing will happen by magic on his 21st so that he knows how to drink responsibly.

You get there from learning the feeling of alcohol in your own system.

Then why not start in preschool? Lots of practice!

You don't know anything about how the brain develops, do you?

yes, starting at 15 we let them have a beer or a glass of wine at home now and then

I'm one of the PPs from the immigrant family that had wine on the table, and even made spritzers for the teens with Sunday dinner (um, gross, because it was with soda!) and while I never saw alcohol as taboo, I still binge drank to excess in college and in my 20s. I think a LOT of that is personality driven. I like to go out, to dance, to party and I had strict parents so I did very very little of that in HS. So while the early onset of drinking data is clear, I think there is context missing- there is a social construct around drinking. Party drinking and beer flight tasting with a giant burger with dad is different because of that context. It just is.

Absolutely. And it isn't illegal to do so. Nothing will happen by magic on his 21st so that he knows how to drink responsibly.

You get there from learning the feeling of alcohol in your own system.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I come from a military family where we lived in Europe starting when I was 12. I was served wine at dinners with Italian and other foreign officers....not a lot..but a small glass. It taught me to what sort of wines I liked and I learned how to pair wines with food. I then went on to live in Belgium for four years and learned about beer. These have been life skills for me going forward. I will certainly teaching my children about wine and beer.

Side note: did you live at SHAPE? I've met some people who lived there as teens (15+ years ago) and they said it was wild!

No, I went to college in Belgium so I never had the taboo drinking thinking. I actually never brings drank until I got back to the US in my 20s. The people who say it was wild ate probably exaggerating. We had more freedom in some ways but if we got caught our parents go in trouble and we could get sent back to the US. You had to be a really bad kid to cross certain lines because it would hurt your parents career.

The first link discusses that literature on the subject is varied and finds that kids who were drinking in high school were more likely to drink heavily the first semester of college. I guess if you think that first semester is a particularly bad time to drink heavily that might be helpful info but still not very relevant to kids home from college. The last is just about overall levels of drinking and I don't think that's very helpful either for these purposes.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We started allowing our children to drink during trips to Europe. Waiters would bring wine glasses for children when there were as young as 14 or 15. I think it helped demystify alcohol and made drinking a glass of wine with a meal very enjoyable for them. I think a drinking age of 21 is insanely puritanical and causes many unintended consequences not the least of which is binge drinking on college campuses.

I wish we would put this pervasive "BUT IN EUROPE!!!" myth to rest. Europeans have among the highest binge drinking/alcoholism rates in the world, including among teens.

If you want to serve your kid alcohol that's fine, but don't act like there's even a hint of data suggesting it is beneficial. In fact, the research is crystal clear that age one started drinking and binge drinking rates are very much inversely correlated.

Exactly! The research is actually pretty clear on this, but for some reason, this myth that letting your kids drink alcohol in your presence makes them less likely to binge drink with friends remains...

I highly doubt it. Post your sources.

This one's an analysis of 22 studies on this issue:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4108600/

I don't think those studies are very relevant to this discussion. For example, one looked at parents providing sips of alcohol to 4th and 6th graders. Probably the closest is a study of 15 year olds in the Netherlands but even that I wonder how relevant it is.

Did you look at the first set if links I posted? The first looked at high school seniors and the last looks at alcohol consumption in the U.S. versus Europe.

No. Not my style. Although I don't have a college student yet, and maybe would consider it after they go to college and are home on breaks.

We rarely drink at home, though, so I don't think it would even come up. I can't think of the last time I had an alcoholic drink at home. (but I drink at restaurants and such - with or without my kids present).

I've been to enough seminars/presentations/etc. to feel very secure in my stance on this. I'm sure we can all find data to back up whichever side of this we are on, but the experts that I've found myself most aligned with have always advised against providing alcohol to your minor children.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We started allowing our children to drink during trips to Europe. Waiters would bring wine glasses for children when there were as young as 14 or 15. I think it helped demystify alcohol and made drinking a glass of wine with a meal very enjoyable for them. I think a drinking age of 21 is insanely puritanical and causes many unintended consequences not the least of which is binge drinking on college campuses.

I wish we would put this pervasive "BUT IN EUROPE!!!" myth to rest. Europeans have among the highest binge drinking/alcoholism rates in the world, including among teens.

If you want to serve your kid alcohol that's fine, but don't act like there's even a hint of data suggesting it is beneficial. In fact, the research is crystal clear that age one started drinking and binge drinking rates are very much inversely correlated.

Exactly! The research is actually pretty clear on this, but for some reason, this myth that letting your kids drink alcohol in your presence makes them less likely to binge drink with friends remains...

I highly doubt it. Post your sources.

This one's an analysis of 22 studies on this issue:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4108600/

I don't think those studies are very relevant to this discussion. For example, one looked at parents providing sips of alcohol to 4th and 6th graders. Probably the closest is a study of 15 year olds in the Netherlands but even that I wonder how relevant it is.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We started allowing our children to drink during trips to Europe. Waiters would bring wine glasses for children when there were as young as 14 or 15. I think it helped demystify alcohol and made drinking a glass of wine with a meal very enjoyable for them. I think a drinking age of 21 is insanely puritanical and causes many unintended consequences not the least of which is binge drinking on college campuses.

I wish we would put this pervasive "BUT IN EUROPE!!!" myth to rest. Europeans have among the highest binge drinking/alcoholism rates in the world, including among teens.

If you want to serve your kid alcohol that's fine, but don't act like there's even a hint of data suggesting it is beneficial. In fact, the research is crystal clear that age one started drinking and binge drinking rates are very much inversely correlated.

Exactly! The research is actually pretty clear on this, but for some reason, this myth that letting your kids drink alcohol in your presence makes them less likely to binge drink with friends remains...

I highly doubt it. Post your sources.

This one's an analysis of 22 studies on this issue:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4108600/

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We started allowing our children to drink during trips to Europe. Waiters would bring wine glasses for children when there were as young as 14 or 15. I think it helped demystify alcohol and made drinking a glass of wine with a meal very enjoyable for them. I think a drinking age of 21 is insanely puritanical and causes many unintended consequences not the least of which is binge drinking on college campuses.

I wish we would put this pervasive "BUT IN EUROPE!!!" myth to rest. Europeans have among the highest binge drinking/alcoholism rates in the world, including among teens.

If you want to serve your kid alcohol that's fine, but don't act like there's even a hint of data suggesting it is beneficial. In fact, the research is crystal clear that age one started drinking and binge drinking rates are very much inversely correlated.

Exactly! The research is actually pretty clear on this, but for some reason, this myth that letting your kids drink alcohol in your presence makes them less likely to binge drink with friends remains...

I highly doubt it. Post your sources.

Here are a few:


https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20805017

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17854336

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21513678

http://resources.prev.org/documents/ESPAD.pdf

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We started allowing our children to drink during trips to Europe. Waiters would bring wine glasses for children when there were as young as 14 or 15. I think it helped demystify alcohol and made drinking a glass of wine with a meal very enjoyable for them. I think a drinking age of 21 is insanely puritanical and causes many unintended consequences not the least of which is binge drinking on college campuses.

I wish we would put this pervasive "BUT IN EUROPE!!!" myth to rest. Europeans have among the highest binge drinking/alcoholism rates in the world, including among teens.

If you want to serve your kid alcohol that's fine, but don't act like there's even a hint of data suggesting it is beneficial. In fact, the research is crystal clear that age one started drinking and binge drinking rates are very much inversely correlated.

Exactly! The research is actually pretty clear on this, but for some reason, this myth that letting your kids drink alcohol in your presence makes them less likely to binge drink with friends remains...

I highly doubt it. Post your sources.